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Where is Joe Friday when you need him, like during this election campaign? Who is going to check the candidates on their positions, statements, speeches, and especially their attacks on each other, which are getting more vicious? And now, who will also check the media, especially the cable networks, who are increasingly just dividing along partisan political lines?

Where do we go to find the facts? Unfortunately, the media (especially the cable television networks and talk radio shows) are of less and less help -- especially in presenting "just the facts." I try to watch all the Sunday morning news shows some time during the day. Last Sunday's Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace had a long feature with one "analyst" to help us all understand what was happening in this election. The analyst? Karl Rove -- the only analyst. The great Republican architect has now become the great Republican analyst.  Now how's that for "fair and balanced?" And if you want the political alternative, just turn on MSNBC, which is increasingly the ideological counterpoint and competitor with Fox. Then we go to CNN, where more and more of the commentators have become surrogates for one side or the other, saying predictable things along predictable party lines, with notable exceptions like David Gergen, who has worked in the White House for both Republican and Democratic Administrations and really does try to be fair and balanced.

Most of you are also too young to remember when evening news anchors were mostly eloquent narrators of the news. Now turning on television is like tuning into an ongoing partisan debate or, worse, seeing a succession of negative ads fighting back and forth in the name of commentary.

There are, however, a few segments on television, and more investigative stories in the newspapers, where journalists are trying to do the job of keeping the politicians honest. And there are respected fact checking places emerging on the Internet which appear to be developing respect on both sides of the aisle -- a very rare thing these days. One of them is FactCheck.org, whose spokespersons seem to be both fair and balanced. So far, I have seen them do helpful fact checking into the lies now being told in campaign ads and the overstretching of the truth in both campaigns. No, Obama did not support a bill in Illinois to teach sex education to kindergartners, but rather one to protect them from sexual predators. And no, McCain didn't say we should keep the war going in Iraq for a hundred years if necessary, just that we might have to support troops there that long as we do in other places.

Check the facts very carefully when the campaigns tell you what their opponent will do on taxes. Hopefully, there will be more of such places emerging that can be trusted. Send in the best choices for fact checking in your experience. Let's find some Joe Fridays out there -- "Just the facts, ma'am." Better yet, let's try to be Joe Fridays ourselves.

[Correction: Thanks to our fack-checking commenters, we have learned that the Dragnet detective's name was, in fact, Joe Friday (not Jack Friday), and the actor's name was Jack Webb. This correction is now reflected in the text.]

Colombian Mennonite Church President Alix Lozano writes:

Héctor H. Mondragón has been a member of our church since 1994, that is, 14 years. We have known him as a Christian not only committed to the cause of Jesus Christ, but also to Jesus' teaching and example of nonviolent love. ... His positions towards the government as well as toward the insurgent groups have been clear. ... The Colombian Mennonite Church rejects any attempt to link one of its members -- and in this particular case Héctor H. Mondragón -- to any armed group or any violent practice or to slander his/her name, which as we all know, is also extremely dangerous for the life and security of any person in this context. (Click here for the full statement; aquí para español.)

You can also read Héctor's response in his own powerful words in an essay called "My choice for civil resistance" (aquí para español):

Those who know me know very clearly that I am not part of the FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia), because I disagree with their strategy, their political line, and their methods.

For 18 years, I have publicly and privately differed from the FARC's strategy. That strategy is centered on the role of the guerrilla converted into a revolutionary army, through which the people can seize power and transform society. ... It has become a tragedy for popular struggles. It has permitted the strengthening of the extreme right, which today is running the country. Not only has it failed to stop the displacement of hundreds of thousands of peasants and Afro-Colombians, but it has actually exacerbated that process, and even provoked the forced displacement of indigenous peoples in various parts of the country. ...

Since 1994 I have opted for a personal commitment to nonviolence as the way to contribute to radical social change. I renounced the use of arms in self defense under any circumstance. I got rid of two revolvers that I had legally carried since I had been threatened with assassination ... I stopped working with bodyguards because I did not want to save my life at the expense of another. I ended up abandoning all routines, and thus the possibility of a stable job, in order to avoid being assassinated. I believe in the struggle for radical social change, but I believe it must be accompanied with a radical change of method, the abandonment of armed struggle and the abandonment of the notion that the end justifies the means. The radical means of nonviolence can help us reach the objective of truly radical social change. ...

It is not about replacing one corrupt, right wing government with another. It is not about exchanging one set of gangsters for another, so that our friends can rule instead of our enemies. It is not about demonstrating "governability" without meeting the basic needs of the 80% of Colombians who live in poverty. Colombia needs deep changes, especially on the land and in its relationship to the transnationals. And the only way to win these changes is to deploy the widest civil resistance, to construct alternatives from the base, and to have massive and committed civil mobilization. Absolutely everything I have done in these years, every single day, has been to work towards this with all my strength and all my experience.

Today, I still carry wounds from the torture that I suffered in 1977 and also from 20 years of being threatened with death, pursued by the paramilitaries. Sometimes I lose hope, especially when I know that some of my friends have been killed. I ask myself why continue in this struggle with indigenous people and peasants, why not give up. But then I am struck again with the passion for the people I love and the certainty that they deserve lives with dignity, and solidarity. They failed to kill my body but today they are threatening to kill my words, and I feel it like a re-opening of my old wounds. But the word is a seed and it grows, whatever happens, in the peasant on the land, in an indigenous person in her territory, in Afro-Colombians returning to their communities, in those who live in the popular neighborhoods of the cities who will eat better after the land reform that we will win, in every working family that will get a just wage for work, there the word will live. They won't be able to kill it.

A call to action may be forthcoming.  For the time being we invite you to share this concerning turn of events and pray.  Héctor writes, "I remain firm in prayer and many have prayed for me as well.  They sustain me.  (Me he aferrado a la oracin y muchos han orado por m. Me llegan muchos apoyos y me sostienen. )"

Janna Hunter-Bowman works for Mennonite Central Committee in Bogotá, Colombia, as the coordinator of the Documentation and Advocacy Program for Justapaz.

Just war theory has a long history inside of Christianity.  It is a middle way between holy war and pacifism.  However, just peace theory occupies the ground between just war theory and pacifism.  From the perspective of just peace theory, just war theory is only war.  It presupposes war.  It comes into the discourse at the moment when a conflict reaches a crisis point and the possibility of war.  The conversation becomes about making the case for war using just war principles.  In contrast, just peace theory presupposes peace.  The discourse becomes about what the nation is doing to preserve the peace.  Further, just peace theory moves beyond just war theory because just war theory is unrealistic in the face of the nature of war itself.

For example, before a war we consider just cause.  In reality, the causes of war are always multiple, complex, and entangled. So underneath arguments about defense and humanitarian intervention, there often lies an economic intent.  Further, once war begins, no one can ever know how successful a nation will be in executing the war.  Just war during war calls for the immunity of innocents and the protection of noncombatants from being targets of violence.  Realistically, innocents always die in war.  Some will object that this is an argument of moral equivalency.  It is.  The blood and tears are equivalent; people are equivalently killed and physically and psychologically injured.   An innocent ecology is equivalently wounded.

Moreover, the nature of warfare is to defeat an enemy by any means necessary, and this includes using weapons and tactics that will demoralize the enemy even if that means killing innocents.  Just war theory cannot come to terms with this reality.

Just peace theory understands that peacemaking happens every day, that the only just war is the war that we prevent because there is no such thing as victory in war.  War itself is a defeat of human reason, communication, truth, and respect.  At the same time, just peace theory recognizes there may be times when a military force ought to deploy to protect vulnerable populations or to enforce a peace agreement.

September 21 is the U.N. International Day of Peace and Global Cease-fire.  It is a day when the world can pause to think about ways to make justice and peace the project and the goal of daily life.

Dr. Valerie Elverton Dixon is an independent scholar who publishes lectures and essays at JustPeaceTheory.com. She received her Ph.D. in religion and society from Temple University and taught Christian ethics at United Theological Seminary and Andover Newton Theological School     

- Jeremiah 6:16

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- Lawrence Kushner

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We lived through this kind of power outage before -- during the ice storm of 2004.  So neighbors are pulling together, checking on the elderly, and making sure everyone has enough supplies to last until the power is restored. The Granville college students are helping with water delivery and clearing the trees.  Local residents are pooling their cash and making trips to stores in Columbus that have opened to sell water, batteries, candles, and other necessities.  Churches are checking on their shut-ins and providing food to those without the necessary provisions. The local government turned out road crews with chain saws and tools to clear blocked streets and passages.  And in the one coffee shop that has electricity, residents are sharing the electrical outlets as we charge up our laptop computers, Blackberries, and cell phones.  So, all in all, our small community will weather this storm.

But I wondered last night, when I saw one gas station charging $5.99 per gallon for gasoline, what about those who are living on the edge here?  Are the folks in the trailer park at the edge of town okay?  Can they afford to pay for price-gouged gas?  Can they afford to replace an entire refrigerator and freezer worth of food that is now spoiled?  Do they have the extra cash to buy emergency supplies and food for a week until the power comes back on?  Can they take their child to work for the day, or a week, until the schools and childcares open again?   

One in six children in Ohio is hungry.  How many of those children will miss their government subsidized meals this week because the schools are closed and the meals cannot be prepared?  Poverty hurts -- and an unexpected emergency like a windstorm and a long term power outage makes poverty hurt even more by laying bare the continued economic disparity in our country -- and in my small town.   

These are the issues that propel me forward in my work to Vote Out Poverty.  These are the questions that drive me to ask pastor after pastor after pastor to host a Poverty Sunday this fall to raise the consciousness of parishioners in the pews about poverty.  These are the questions that had me participating by candlelight last night in a national conference call with Jim Wallis to Vote Out Poverty.  And these are the questions that have turned the Lord's Prayer into my plea: "thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven."

Please keep in prayer the families of the three people killed in Ohio last night during the windstorm, as well as the thousands and thousands in Texas and the Gulf Coast who were displaced by Hurricane Ike.  Please also pray: "The world now has the means to end extreme poverty; we pray we will have the will."

Rev. Virginia Lohmann Bauman lives in Granville, Ohio with her family, and she is the Ohio Field Director for Sojourners.

1. The economy is in grave danger. Over the weekend, two more of the nation's top investment banking firms have gone down. Lehman Brothers declared bankruptcy, and Merrill Lynch was sold to Bank of America. With the earlier demise of Bear Stearns, that's three out of the nation's top five investment banks who have not been able to weather the financial storms triggered by the subprime lending crisis. Analysts this morning say this is either the beginning of the end of the crisis or the beginning of the end. The stock market looks like it fears the second outcome. Ordinary Americans are worried about college and retirement funds and, much worse -- a downward economic spiral that affects most all of us. We need more than personalities here.
2. "Poverty is now our next door neighbor." That's what a hospital administrator said to me during my annual physical last week. With foreclosures, declining housing equity and opportunity, job losses, stagnant wages, and lack of affordable healthcare, more and more people are being affected. And, of course, those at the bottom are in the worse shape of all.
3. Globally, the progress we were making on international poverty has been seriously set back because of food and fuel prices. Untold numbers of people are facing starvation.
4. There continue to be about 1.3 million abortions a year.  Partisan shouting on both sides during election seasons has prevented our finding solutions that result in real abortion reduction.
5. A broken immigration system is resulting in more and more raids on workplaces, breaking up thousands of families.  How can we create reforms that are compassionate and just along with protecting our borders?
6. Global warming is shrinking the polar ice cap at an unprecedented rate, more plant and animal species are endangered, and weather patterns are becoming erratic and more dangerous.  How can we stop and reverse climate change?
7. The war in Afghanistan has gone on for seven years now, yet the situation on the ground is getting worse by most accounts. The war in Iraq has gone on for more than five. Some claim progress and others say the underlying issues remain unresolved. Both those who want "victory" and those who say we should "end" the war must show their plans for success.  There are other wars now threatening in places like Iran and Syria. How many more wars can we fight at one time? The military is severely strained, especially service men and women and their families. And those veterans who come home needing so many things are not getting them.
8. We are no closer to a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, still a critical factor in Middle East conflicts.
9. The conduct of the United States' war on terrorism has taken a great toll on America's standing in the world. The use of torture, the abuse at Abu Ghraib, the treatment of detainees at Guantanamo and secret prisons around the world have all taken their moral toll. There needs to be a plan to repair the nation's moral stature.
10. The great danger of nuclear proliferation continues unabated. And even the pleas of national security wise men, from both sides of the aisle, have not been heeded.

And because each of you has other crises you think should be added (I can think of another ten easily), it becomes more and more clear that voting on personalities this election would be irresponsible. It's time to focus on the issues, the records of the candidates, and their plans for solving the massive problems that we face.  That will be the subject of my blog posts between here and the election -- and what a more "prophetic" than "partisan" Christian witness might be. Stay tuned.

Unfortunately, these boys' story is not unique. Over the past year, throughout the country the Department of Homeland Security has conducted increasingly numerous worksite enforcement raids that target employers who hire unauthorized workers. During these raids, large numbers of workers who have often worked in difficult and appalling conditions are arrested. Children are separated from their working parents for days at a time, and community life is disrupted.

Last week, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops issued a statement urging Homeland Security to discontinue worksite enforcement raids until several "humanitarian safeguards" are put into place. The statement says, "The humanitarian costs of these raids are immeasurable and unacceptable in a civilized society" and reminds us that "many families never recover, others never reunite."

Catholic social teaching states that the family is the "fundamental institution upon which society and government itself depends" and that the family "must be supported and strengthened." May Christians follow the lead of these courageous bishops to speak with one voice, urging the government to support families and put an end to the inhumane practices of worksite enforcement raids.

Jennifer Svetlik is a policy and organizing assistant at Sojourners.

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- Flannery O'Connor

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Why do you make me see wrongdoing
and look at trouble?
Destruction and violence are before me;
strife and contention arise.

- Habakkuk 1:2-3

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Once upon a time there was a house...

Anything that begins with such words as that usually carries with it the implicit promise that a tale is about to be told. "Once upon a time" rarely is a vehicle for conveying factual or objective truth. Rather, we have learned to read it as the set piece that introduces a bit of folk entertainment which, in the end, will leave us with a bit of folk wisdom forever wrapped in a memorable tale. All well and good and as it should be.

On the other hand, when a professional religionist begins something by saying, "Once upon a time," there is the hesitant assumption that the forthcoming insight or wisdom will be less folk or common wisdom and more geared toward making some kind of moral point. And when a professional religionist begins something by saying, "Once upon a time, there was a house...," there is every reason to assume -- especially if the religionist is a Christian -- that we are about to re-visit, whether we wish to or not, the parable of the two houses. One was built on a solid foundation of rock so that, when the storms came, it withstood their onslaught and remained standing. The other was built upon a foundation of sand and, when the storms came, crumbled under their onslaught and fell down. It is one of the better known of Jesus' parables and contains something very close to folk wisdom or common sense in addition to its theological ramifications.

Actually, a number of New Testament parables are common sense or folk wisdom tales, requiring not much depth of perception to understand and yet still wrapped in the skin of story and entertainment ... a fact which is, I suspect, a good deal of the reason for our having a certain kind of laziness about extending them into our own time instead of leaving them as quaint, but still honored, artifacts of an earlier one. All of this came to mind for me three or four Sundays ago when the parable of the two houses was the New Testament reading for the congregation with whom I was worshipping at the time. I've been chewing on the matter ever since. So...

Once upon a time, there was a house, whether on sand or rock, I can not say; but let us assume that this house was securely positioned, at least for our purposes here. Now this house of ours had an occupant. Who, we don't know, but an occupant. That occupant has a family ... a mate, children, a few pets, and an occasional relative or friend who comes for a visit. Now the children are all worrisome and gratifying and demanding, as children are supposed to be. The mate is the beloved whom the occupant can hardly bear at times, though it is clear that each of them is really in the business of sculpting the other into something that more resembles half of a new whole than it does anything else. The pets all bounce around ... or the dogs do, anyway. The cats prefer to sit back, tails curled under them, and wait to be asked about what should be done next. The pets are quite dear at times and not so dear at others, but all of them are fed and housed with an affection which, unlike that extended to the children and the mate, is largely untainted by any sense of obligation or duty.

The house has all the appointments that one would expect. There are windows, well-positioned not only to let in the light, but also to admit of good cross-ventilation. There is an adequate electric system that also keeps the house well-lit, warm enough and cool enough, and very functional. Likewise, the plumbing is in good balance with the needs of the house, though like all plumbing, it will occasionally suffer from overload and back up or will be the dumping place for more than it can handle and overflow. These are ongoing nuisances that cause the occupant only passing inconvenience, but rarely extended difficulty. There is the usual division of the house's rooms into those that are more or less public and those that are private and also, of course, those that are distinctly personal ... or at least, from time to time and on a routine basis, their use is. There is, as we would expect, a lovely, warm, cheerful kitchen which transcends the categories and simply is communal space at all times. The occupant, being a good person, sees to the house and its maintenance responsibly, consulting experts from time to time, when that is necessary, and spending time and money, as well as energy, in seeing to the house's ongoing good health.

In all of this, it is very clear to all concerned that the occupant is not the electrical system, though neither the house not the occupant would scarcely be able to function without it. It is equally clear that the inviting, communal kitchen is not the occupant, nor are the attractively dressed windows nor the front porch and flowers beds that complement the house. The furnishings, all of them adequate and suited to their purposes, are not the occupant, even though they are used constantly for the comfort, sustenance, and betterment of the occupant. And certainly no one would ever think that the occupant was the stairways which went up and down, from basement to first floor to second floor to attic, or even from doorways to driveway and sidewalk and patio. The occupant is none of these things, in part, of course, because the occupant isn't a "thing" and therefore can never be one. It is true, however, that the occupant could not long survive without a house of some sort, be it this one we are speaking of, or some other shelter.

But the house and the occupant do share one commonality: they both will someday cease to be. Both will pass away. The occupant, who was not the house, will die; and the house, who was not the occupant, will burn down or molder down or be torn down or undergo some other such ending. All will be gone. All the pieces and parts of our lovely story gone into dust and ashes. All of them gone as pieces, anyway. What is and always will be is what neither the house nor the occupant, as separate entities, ever was. What is and is ever to be is home ... the joy-giving, rest-filled, and light-bearing presence within experience of the reality of "home." What is, is the translation of passing tangibles into the eternal. What is, is the fusing of occupant and house into one that is neither, but both together. What is, is a story about an occupant and a house that, in truth, is really a story resurrection bodies and the kingdom of God, as in "Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as in Heaven." Or so it seems to me anyway.

Phyllis Tickle (www.phyllistickle.com) is the founding editor of the religion department of Publishers Weekly and author of The Words of Jesus: A Gospel of the Sayings of Our Lord and the forthcoming fall release, The Great Emergence: How Christianity Is Changing and Why.

I first started learning about the sport of marksmanship when I was 10 years old at "Camp Good News." We practiced with our BB rifles every day after our morning worship services. I graduated to a .22 rifle soon after to rid our family's barn of pigeons and our garden of woodchucks. In the fall, our family would enjoy venison stew that came from deer shot in the woods behind our house. 

What has stopped me from signing up for the NRA thus far has been their support of legislation such as H.R. 6691. This legislation has nothing to do with the Constitution and everything to do with powerful business interests looking to make a profit by moving more product. This legislation would allow residents of D.C. to legally walk the streets with loaded AK-47s. It would make it legal to own .50 caliber sniper rifles with an accuracy of up to 1 mile in our nation's capital. 

The NRA has lost its way. It has made an organization of sportsmen and women into a cover organization for business interests ready to sacrifice safety and national security for their bottom line. 

I am ready to join the NRA the day I can be convinced that its goals are to protect my constitutional rights and not to protect business interests at the expense of public safety.  Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton, D.C.'s non-voting member of Congress, has introduced alternative legislation that would responsibly ensure the District's adherence to the Supreme Court's ruling.  If it was about the Constitution, H.R. 6691 would be unnecessary.    

So one day, when the NRA puts American lives, safety, and rights first -- and not lobbying dollars -- I'll join.

Tim King is the special assistant to the CEO for Sojourners. For more information, visit the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence.

The bill, which seems headed toward passage in the House, is advertised by its supporters as a necessary response to the Supreme Court ruling in June that struck down the district's 32-year-old ban on possessing handguns in the home. It is nothing of the sort. The City Council has already passed temporary changes to comply with the ruling and is working on permanent revisions.

This extreme bill goes way beyond what the high court required. Among other things, it would repeal a ban on semiautomatic assault weapons and eliminate firearm registration requirements, even for such things as sniper rifles and small, easily concealed semiautomatic handguns. Under the lunatic logic of this bill, made to order for the gun lobby, such rifles could be toted around on the street fully loaded.

Sojourners has a long history in the Columbia Heights neighborhood in D.C., and many of our staff and their families live in the area in addition to working here. For many years we ran a neighborhood center and saw the results of gun violence in the lives of children who attended programs at the center.

So while we agree that the District of Columbia must adhere to the Supreme Court decision on handgun ownership, Congress should listen to residents, local businesses, and organizations and their need for safe streets, schools, and homes, and vote against HR 6691.

Elizabeth Denlinger is deputy director for policy and organizing at Sojourners.

Greetings from Brazil! Rosalee and I have been following this exchange closely even if from afar -- or à distância. A few of our friends in the U.S. -- including Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove, Ángel Gallardo (who has lived at both Simple Way and Rutba House), and Eliacin Rosario-Cruz -- are or have been part of New Monastic communities. In addition, our local church in the U.S. is Mt. Level Missionary Baptist Church in Durham, North Carolina, a historically African-American congregation. From our friends and mentors there, we began to learn about race and racial reconciliaton. 

All this to say: Even though we write from afar, we write because we find ourselves a part of this conversation. Here are a couple of our observations:         

1) Why this conversation needs to be happening. There is no "gracious and hopeful invitation to public dialogue" about Christian community and race in Brazil. On the one hand, there is no New Monastic movement here, but there are base Christian communities and other vibrant examples of comunidade. On the other, the race question is more slippery, in large part due to the fact that belief in the "myth of racial democracy" (as it is called here) is still popularly affirmed. But all our Afro-Brazilian friends are quick to point out that Brazil, too, suffers deeply from its own racial wounds. (If there is any doubt, consider that (1) of the roughly 10 million Africans who were enslaved during the colonial slave trade, around a half million were taken to the U.S., and around 4 million were brought to Brazil; and (2) recent estimates indicate that 31 million Brazilians live below the poverty line. Of those 31 million, 80 percent are of African descent.) Yet given that harsh reality, there is still no serious public conversation about race within the Brazilian church.  

Recently, we participated in a forum at a church in Salvador that is part of the government-sponsored campaign called "Program Against Institutional Racism." We found out afterward that this was the first time such a forum had taken place in a church in Salvador -- where the population is between 80 to 90 percent black. Race is being talked about, but, unfortunately, almost all of the prophets are found outside of the Christian community.

So, first of all, we are encouraged by this conversation as it challenges us in Brazil to embody New Monasticism's Mark #4: "Lament for Racial Divisions Within the Church and Our Communities Combined with the Active Pursuit of a Just Reconciliation."

2) What submission might look like. These conversations reminded us of a scene from Ken Burns' documentary, Jazz. There's an interview with Ossie Davis in which he, an African-American, describes how Benny Goodman, who was white, crossed the colorline to learn jazz in Harlem:

"I think Benny Goodman was the man who stood "outside" and was attracted to something he heard "inside" and came inside himself, and saw what was going on and picked up the nearest thing and joined it. He experienced in his own person the "true welcome" that's at the root of jazz. For him to cross the threshold was easy, because jazz made it easy." (Jazz, disc 2,"Swing, Pure Pleasure," Title 3, Chapter 7)

Benny Goodman went to them and learned their cultural forms, yet he didn't submit to the African-American jazz community. Instead he took their riffs, and their songs, and became one of the biggest bandleaders of all time.

The point -- the connection between this scene and this conversation -- is this: It's one thing to relocate (Mark #1), to cross over, to receive the "true welcome," and to learn from our neighbors. But the real question is about submission (Mark #5). How do we build a "collective witness" that moves from Mark #4 to Mark #5: "Humble Submission to Christ's Body, the Church." If white privilege, dominance, and male leadership have been recognized as problems, what would submission look like here? 

As we read it, Jason and Vonetta, Eliacin, and Gabriel don't question whether white guys can be in the band. But they raise another question: What would it look like to be in the band without leading it?

We look forward to hearing more from this "jam session." Who knows, maybe we'll even hear a little samba.

Sam (native Tarheel) and Rosalee (Brazilian-American) Ewell live in Brazil with their three kids, James, Isabella, and Katharine. Sam is a theological educator/networker with School for Conversion-Latin America and local pastor at Igreja Batista Catuaí (and a late convert to soccer). Rosalee also works as a theological educator and writer, primarily through her work with the Comité Bíblico Latinoamericano.

[Click here to see all posts in this conversation on New Monastics and race.]

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- Dietrich Bonhoeffer

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- Matthew 15:32

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Jim Forest is the international secretary of the Orthodox Peace Fellowship (www.incommunion.org), editor of its journal In Communion, and author of Praying With Icons and The Road to Emmaus: Pilgrimage as a Way of Life.

Seven years later, as we remember that day, it is appropriate to reflect on this statement and to wonder how the world would be different if its counsel had been heeded. 

We "demand[ed] that those responsible for these utterly evil acts be found and brought to justice.  Those culpable must not escape accountability."  Yet after seven years of war in Afghanistan, we are still engaged against a resurgent Taliban and al Qaeda, and Osama bin Laden has still not been found.  Then, 9/11 was used as a rationale to invade and occupy Iraq, a conflict that has now taken the lives of more than 4,000 American troops and countless Iraqis.  Rather than "the vision of community, tolerance, compassion, justice, and the sacredness of human life, which lies at the heart of all our religious traditions," we have seen the erosion of our civil liberties, torture at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, and indefinite detentions without trial.

Today on this anniversary, let us pause to remember those who died, to reflect on what has happened since, and once again, "Let us rededicate ourselves to global peace, human dignity, and the eradication of the injustice that breeds rage and vengeance." We offered a different way to deny the terrorists their victory, which, I believe, could still be followed. It's not too late to change our course. Please read and reflect upon the original statement.

DENY THEM THEIR VICTORY: A RELIGIOUS RESPONSE TO TERRORISM

We, American religious leaders, share the broken hearts of our fellow citizens. The worst terrorist attack in history that assaulted New York City, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania has been felt in every American community.  Each life lost was of unique and sacred value in the eyes of God, and the connections Americans feel to those lives run very deep. In the face of such a cruel catastrophe, it is a time to look to God and to each other for the strength we need and the response we will make. We must dig deep to the roots of our faith for sustenance, solace and wisdom.

First, we must find a word of consolation for the untold pain and suffering of our people. Our congregations will offer their practical and pastoral resources to bind up the wounds of the nation. We can become safe places to weep and secure places to begin rebuilding our shattered lives and communities. Our houses of worship should become public arenas for common prayer, community discussion, eventual healing, and forgiveness.

Second, we offer a word of sober restraint as our nation discerns what its response will be. We share the deep anger toward those who so callously and massively destroy innocent lives, no matter what the grievances or injustices invoked. In the name of God, we too demand that those responsible for these utterly evil acts be found and brought to justice.  Those culpable must not escape accountability. But we must not, out of anger and vengeance, indiscriminately retaliate in ways that bring on even more loss of innocent life. We pray that President Bush and members of Congress will seek the wisdom of God as they decide upon the appropriate response.

Third, we face deep and profound questions of what this attack on America will do to us as a nation. The terrorists have offered us a stark view of the world they would create, where the remedy to every human grievance and injustice is a resort to the random and cowardly violence of revenge -- even against the most innocent. Having taken thousands of our lives, attacked our national symbols, forced our political leaders to flee their chambers of governance, disrupted our work and families, and struck fear into the hearts of our children, the terrorists must feel victorious.

But we can deny them their victory by refusing to submit to a world created in their image. Terrorism inflicts not only death and destruction but also emotional oppression to further its aims. We must not allow this terror to drive us away from being the people God has called us to be.  We assert the vision of community, tolerance, compassion, justice, and the sacredness of human life, which lies at the heart of all our religious traditions. America must be a safe place for all our citizens in all their diversity. It is especially important that our citizens who share national origins, ethnicity, or religion with whoever attacked us are, themselves, protected among us.

Our American illusion of invulnerability has been shattered.  From now on, we will look at the world in a different way, and this attack on our life as a nation will become a test of our national character. Let us make the right choices in this crisis -- to pray, act, and unite against the bitter fruits of division, hatred and violence. Let us rededicate ourselves to global peace, human dignity, and the eradication of the injustice that breeds rage and vengeance.

As we gather in our houses of worship, let us begin a process of seeking the healing and grace of God.

- Arundhati Roy
From her book, The Algebra of Infinite Justice

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